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Catriona Matthew could be as much of a danger to defending champion Jiyai Shin as anyone in next month's HSBC Women's Champions at the Tanah Merah Country Club.

As she amply demonstrated last year when she won the Ricoh Women's British Open at Lytham 11 weeks after giving birth, Matthew thrives on a break and, in the lead up to this Champions, she has had a good month away from the game.

As much as she wanted the down-time, this 40-year-old mother of two did not have much of a choice in the matter. Scotland's East coast had more than its share of snow over Christmas and the New Year and it was only towards the end of January that Archerfield, her home course, was ready for play.

In its own way, Matthew's month off was no less busy than any at the height of the season. Katie and Sophie, now aged three and a half and eight months, had all the usual winter ear and throat infections while, to set against those worries, she had the excitement of learning that she had been awarded an MBE in the New Year Honours List for ‘Services to Golf'.

All of a sudden, favourite memories from Lytham started to give way to thoughts of what she would wear to Buckingham Palace when the ceremony takes place later this year. "It's going to be a great outing," said Matthew, who will make the trip with her husband-cum-accountant-cum-caddie, Graeme.

It was when Geoff Ogilvy won in Kapalua at the start of the US Tour's 2010 season that Matthew's thoughts started to turn to the Champions and the season ahead. "Watching Geoff playing so well suddenly gave me the feeling that I couldn't wait to get out there," she said.

After easing her way back into the swing of things on Archerfield's main practice ground and through playing in Gary Player's pro-am in Abu Dhabi, she started to put in some serious work with her putter. Putting was her strongest suit when she won the Ricoh but, towards the end of the '09 season, the six-ten footers were not dropping with quite the same regularity.

So what was did she think she was doing differently?

"That," she said, cheerfully "is the million dollar question.... All I know is that I need to find a more consistent pace on the greens."

One thing is for sure.... She will definitely be able to stand rather more cosily over her putts at Tanah Merah than was the case 12 months ago. At that point, she was as many as five and a half months pregnant with Sophie and had to seek permission from her doctor before making the trip.

In the circumstances, she saw her top 50 finish as more than satisfying but it goes without saying that the same will hardly apply next month.

Like many another, she suspects that the 21-year-old Shin, who signed off with a pair of matching and mesmerising 66s to finish two clear of Katherine Hull last year, will be mighty tough to unseat. "Jiyai," she said, "is so incredibly consistent. The more you watch her, the more you realise that her bad shots don't begin to be bad. They are never more than fractionally off line and never - or hardly ever - off the fairway. It's such an advantage to be that straight."

Yet if Matthew were to wrest Jiyai's title from her on this occasion, it would not be the first time. Jiyai was the defending champion when she came out on top at Lytham.